Unsigned518 - Episode 193 - Marty Wendell

[00:00:01] Speaker A: He was born on a Saturday in 73 he loves punk rock music on the beat guitar with the short with radio back his motherfucking envy Scrolling look at motherfucker cuz here he comes Andy. [00:00:23] Speaker B: Scrolling wearing his or his welcome to Untied Fire 518. I'm back here with Marty Wendell, how's it going? [00:00:32] Speaker C: Very good, thank you Andy. Always a pleasure to be here. [00:00:35] Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. It's good to see you again. I was looking forward to this one today just because the last time you were on the stories that you told really stuck with me and I've then, you know, passed those stories on to other people and been kind of like, oh, you know this guy Marty that I know, this is a story that he told me. But like to be like one person removed from these Johnny Cash, Kris Kristofferson stories was a really cool experience. So it's cool to have you back and I'm sure we'll maybe dip into some stories later. But I guess we want to just talk about what's been going on since. Because it's been a little over a year, I think since you were here last. It was mid summer last year and you were in the middle of a tour and it was an anniversary tour and there was a lot of events. So I guess maybe give me the postmortem on that and kind of where you're going from there. [00:01:36] Speaker C: Well, that was a really good season, the anniversary season. 60 years. And we had two major shows. One was at the Linda, which unfortunately we're losing. Yeah, and we had a wonderful crowd for that. And we had Jim Gaudet and the Railroad Boys and Heather Richards filled in at the last minute for Carolyn Shapiro who got Covid. But the show was, was great. And then we did the same thing at Cafe Lena and we had the Bluebillies and Greg bucking and just a great crowd and it was, it was great because what I did was kind of at the beginning shared songs from each decade and then moved into a few new things and some of the ones we can't get away from like 57 Chevy. But it was, it was a great night in both, both venues. And then this year we've been out again and had some very, very good shows. We played the Danby Country Music Festival in Vermont. We did some of our regular stops like the Little Theater and just enjoyed being out there and seeing some of our friends and making new friends. [00:03:01] Speaker B: And you know, after the wrapping up like the 60 year anniversary tour, was it just like. Did you take any Time off at all or did you just go right from one thing right into. [00:03:13] Speaker C: Well, what I went into was the studio. [00:03:15] Speaker B: Okay. [00:03:17] Speaker C: And in fact, that's an ongoing thing right now because we're also trying to finish up a Christmas album which we're hoping we can get out for this Christmas. And it has a couple original songs and then just some classic Christmas music. [00:03:36] Speaker B: So, you know, when you go and you know, you say it's an ongoing thing in the studio and you know, I haven't myself done a. A ton of studio work. You know, we've. I've done one full length album and a couple singles, but I've always, just every time I walk in it, even though it's work and there's a lot of work to do, there's just something about being in a recording studio that doesn't feel like work. So, like, were you like, all right, it's time to get back to work? Or were you more like, all right, it's time to have some fun and make some music? [00:04:08] Speaker C: Yeah, I, I really feel like you. I mean, I'd be in there every day if I could. Right. It's therapeutic and it does give you the chance to really create. I mean, your basic creation. You've written this song, but what it's going to turn out to be when you actually start putting the tracks together and what instrumentation where you might add background vocals, all those things, you start painting the picture in the studio. [00:04:40] Speaker B: Right. And that's such a different, you know, growing up, you know, obviously I've been into music my whole life, but like, when you hear songs on the radio, until you really get into the studio, even as an avid music listener or musician, you don't realize how much our producer calls it the salt and pepper happens. You know, things that you don't even necessarily pay attention to. A tambourine or a hand clap or an ooh and ah. And without those, it's a different thing. So like when you're writing a song and say you're just having acoustic guitar and you're writing your song, are you kind of thinking, hey, I, you know, can add this here, or do you just write it from an acoustic guitar standpoint and worry about the salt and pepper later? [00:05:29] Speaker C: Yeah, I think that would be more accurate. I mean, once in a while writing a song, you might have a thought like, gee, I could really hear this. But for the most part, I focus on trying to make the song the best song I can. And then when we get in the studio, having the input of whoever's producing it and other musicians. And that's when, you know, sometimes what I might have imagined for a particular song when it's translated in the studio, comes out to be something quite different. But I think that's the good of the process that I try to go in with an open mind too, that, you know, I try to take all the suggestions and try to hopefully land on the best of them. Maybe, like I say, come out with something that wasn't quite how you might have thought it was going to be. [00:06:27] Speaker B: And do you, like, allow the producer or kind of like outside influence to help with what's going to be added in the song? [00:06:37] Speaker C: Oh, yeah, yeah. I mean, you have other talented people. You want to tap into what they have to offer and not just, you know, this is what I, you know, and, and that wouldn't be fun for them either if they could never make a suggestion. And sometimes they hear something so different. But it's so good that you say, wow, that's. That's what we do want to do. [00:07:06] Speaker B: You know, And I think that relies on, like, the trust of the musicians, you know what I mean? Because if you have the proper musicians around you, you almost don't even have to direct them. [00:07:14] Speaker C: Right. [00:07:14] Speaker B: You just have to present, like, here's what I did. [00:07:16] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:07:17] Speaker B: And they go, okay. And then they add their stuff and, and you, you're right. If, if you've got the right people, then there's stuff that'll come out that you had no idea was even. Even in there. [00:07:28] Speaker C: Yeah. This was produced the Telecaster Cowboy, the newest album by Nico Santone, who's an incredibly talented musician. And he, he not only can do great things instrumentally, but he feels the music and, and that makes a big difference. My son Sean is the same way. He's produced a lot of my albums and he, he's able to. To really lock into, you know, what this song is all about and what we might do to convey that in the best way. [00:08:07] Speaker B: And it's almost like at that quality as a producer, like, because there is definitely some producers that'll kind of be like, no, we want to do it the way I want to do it. But to have a producer that basically lets the. The song dictate how it's going to be done, that to that ability to tap in and be like, oh, I'm going to let the song lead me. But that's a special quality, like alone, because that'll pull things out of. Out of everybody, you know, and one. [00:08:35] Speaker C: Of the things I may have shared this the last time. One of the kind of criteria is that I have as an artist for an album is we don't want everything to be sounding alike. The songs should have their own unique sound. And I think in the past you might have maybe one time in your life heard a song and you thought, gee, that's really good. So you bought the album only to find out that you got 10 or 12 songs that sound like a rewrite of the song that you heard and you wanted. [00:09:10] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:09:11] Speaker C: And really that kind of album is just, it's like filler and, and so we've really tried hard not to get that kind of thing where it's like we're phoning it in. [00:09:24] Speaker B: Well, or just, or, or copying copy and paste, like a game of telephone. You know, you have this wonderful song and then you try to recreate it and it's not as good. Then you recreat again and it kind of stinks and then you recreate it again. [00:09:38] Speaker C: That was a reality in the 50s. A lot of the early rock and roll singers, they hit with a certain song and then their record companies, producers got somebody quick, we'll write another song that sounds like that one. And so they didn't get the opportunity for a while to break out of that. Although some did. One I can think of was Bobby Darren. [00:10:06] Speaker B: Okay. [00:10:07] Speaker C: He started out with some basic four chord rock and roll, but then it wasn't long, he was singing Mac the Knife. Totally different. And evidently his people must have realized this guy can do more. Right. Just this, he can do that. [00:10:23] Speaker B: And if he'd have been stuck in that little, you know, that little teeny genre of again, the copy and paste. [00:10:30] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:10:30] Speaker B: We probably wouldn't know who Bobby Darren is. [00:10:32] Speaker C: Right. [00:10:33] Speaker B: You know. Yeah, that's, that's interesting. And, and you know, back in the 50s, I, I know like 50s and 60s, there was like the Wrecking Crew, you know, that were the, the studio musicians. You know, when you were talking about having musicians you can trust, they were like the musicians that the whole industry could trust. [00:10:53] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:10:53] Speaker B: You know, and like there's so many. [00:10:56] Speaker C: Songs and what was amazing is that they didn't sound alike. [00:11:02] Speaker B: That's what I mean. So many songs across so many genres where it's the, you know, same four, five, six people on it. And, and what was, what was the name of the lady that played? Carol K. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And like, you know, she played bass on hundreds and hundreds of songs that you wouldn't know. [00:11:21] Speaker C: That's where Glenn Campbell started. [00:11:23] Speaker B: Oh, wow. Yeah. [00:11:24] Speaker C: He didn't know, the guitarist in the Wrecking Crew. He played on one of Sinatra's big hits, which, you know, you think Glen Campbell, you don't think Frank Sinatra? [00:11:35] Speaker B: No, I think the Rhinestone Cowboy. Right. [00:11:37] Speaker C: But yeah, he did a lot of interesting things and really was very accomplished guitarist. [00:11:47] Speaker B: That is interesting how that all works, how like, you know, that many people or that few people created that much music and were largely on, you know, largely uncredited. I mean, not uncredited like you can find out what they played on, but. [00:12:04] Speaker C: Like, Jimi Hendrix once was asked, how does it feel to be the greatest guitarist in the world? He said, I don't know. Ask Roy Clark. And that was his opinion. Yeah, And Clark was. Clark is an amazing. [00:12:20] Speaker B: He's a smoking guitar, amazing guitarist. Yeah. And. Well, he was on Hee Haw, right? [00:12:25] Speaker C: Yep. [00:12:26] Speaker B: Yeah, because that's what I remember when I was a kid, you know, in the. In the 70s, watching Hee Haw on Sunday evenings and. And even back then, you know, I was more of a little kid. I was like a rock and roll kid. And my, you know, my parents listened to country music and I was. I was like, I don't like country music. But I was whenever, like, Roy Clark was playing guitar, I was. I was like, oh, man, this guy' Good. Yeah. [00:12:50] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:12:51] Speaker B: So good. So I do want to play a couple songs off the new album and we'll maybe talk some about the creative process of the album and the recording of it. But I guess first let's. Let's play a song. What do you want to play first for everybody? [00:13:10] Speaker C: I think maybe if you want to launch into the actual title song. Okay, Telecaster Cowboy. And you probably wonder what that is all about and how I came up with that really was. I remembered back in the 70s when country music was going through a lot of changes and there began really a focus on the singer, songwriter, and artists recording with their own musicians and getting away from the. The kind of the pop country of Nashville or country politin, whatever you want to call it. And that's when you saw the emergence of people like Chris Christopherson, Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson, Billy Joe Shaver, a lot of those guys, especially the, you know, Texas Crew. And so I was reading this article about kind of looking at this change, and the writer said, and I don't even know who the writer was now, but the last way he ended his article was saying just maybe country music will be saved by Telecaster Cowboys. And that just stuck in my mind. And so on this album, the opening song is a song called Telecaster Cowboy. And then the album closes with the Telecaster Cowboy reprise. So the theme kind of stretches through the album. [00:14:48] Speaker B: Awesome. All right, well, cool. Let's check out Telecaster Cowboy, the title song off the new Marty Wendell album. Then we'll be right back to talk some more with Marty. [00:15:08] Speaker D: You walked in on a Friday night. I was singing, I saw the light. It just had to be love at first sight. You could be my pride and joy. I could be your Telecaster cowboy. I sat down and we talked till dawn. I knew you'd be mine from now on. I realized for sure my heart was gone. You would be my pride and joy. I would be your Telecaster Cowboy. Now I know that's how it started. It all just happened really fast. Just two people brokenhearted who finally found love that could last. I'm still here right by your side. You are still my trusted guide. We both know it's been a real good ride. You are still my pride and joy. I am still your Telecaster Cowboy. [00:17:02] Speaker A: Sam. [00:17:34] Speaker D: Now I know that's how it started. It all just happened really fast. Just two people brokenhearted who finally found love that could last. I'm still here right by your side. You are still my trusted guide. We both know it's been a real good ride. You are still my pride and joy. I am still your Telecaster Cowboy. You are still my pride and joy. I am still your Telecaster Cowboy. [00:18:41] Speaker B: All right, that was Telecaster Cowboy, the title track off the new Marty Wendell album. And Marty, I guess, tell me a little bit about the writing process of Telecaster Cowboy, like, when it began, and kind of take us through the recording of the album. [00:18:58] Speaker C: Really, the songs probably were all written or I think, yeah, pretty much they were written within a two year period. Prior to that, we had the Risky Business album. And it was sort of after that that I started kind of writing some other stuff. And out of that is the songs that we put out on the Telecaster Cowboy album. Kind of in general, my object was you'll notice some of the stories, some of the songs especially tell a story, and then hopefully that the stories kind of elicit some emotions. When people hear that, they'll react to it in some way and trying to be able to sort of paint a picture with a song. And that's what we were going after. [00:19:56] Speaker B: And that's, you know, I always say, like, if music has never made you cry, you're probably not listening. You know, like, I'm like someone and. And I, you know, I'm unabashed about it. I don't I don't care. Like a good song will make me well up. Like, not necessarily. Oh, a sad song is gonna. But like, you know, it hits me in a way that like, makes me emotional. So when you said like painting a picture or to be able to tell a story and then have someone latch onto that in an emotional way is a great approach to storytelling because. Leads them to interpret it themselves kind of. But, you know, because I always think that self interpretation of a song is what I never want to know exactly what the song is really about, you know, because I don't want to know that I'm wrong. [00:20:56] Speaker C: Well, I think that's a positive thing because a song really has a life of its own. Yeah. And it's not going to maybe say the same thing to every person or. [00:21:07] Speaker B: Even the same thing to the same person depending on when they hear it. When they hear it. [00:21:11] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:21:12] Speaker B: Yeah. Like there's songs that I've heard where I think I know the meaning and then I hear the same song a couple weeks later and I'm like, I was. I think I was wrong, you know, and it's just because like where my headspace was is how I'm interpreting the song. Where that might not be the same thing from day to day or even hour to hour, you know, but again, that's how music is. [00:21:37] Speaker C: Yeah. We recently put Atmos in the studio and we pulled out some Sgt. Pepper and it just hits you in a whole different way. It's something you've heard many, many times, but kind of in this new arena of sound. [00:21:57] Speaker B: Right. [00:21:58] Speaker C: It just really hits you differently. [00:22:01] Speaker B: Yeah. And there is something to be said about a sound system that's, you know, that top notch. I mean, I know a lot of people are kind of like, ah, speakers. A speaker. I'm like, that is not the. [00:22:13] Speaker C: Like. [00:22:14] Speaker B: Because that's something really nice when you hear it how it's supposed to be intended. [00:22:19] Speaker C: It can change so many of the things that were kind of in the mix. But now they're, I don't know, just separate. [00:22:27] Speaker B: They're like separated and moved out a little like three dimensional. Yeah. [00:22:32] Speaker C: Yeah. It's probably an analogy watching a 3D movie as to watching just a flat screen. [00:22:39] Speaker B: Yeah. Movie. That's. That's really interesting. I mean, that's a great album. I think I have somewhere around here I have the original sergeant Pepper. [00:22:47] Speaker C: I do too. Yeah. I have a vinyl too. [00:22:49] Speaker B: I have a. I bought just the. Because I have it on vinyl. But I also have just the COVID because that was at A. It was a yard sale or a vinyl sale, and they had the COVID there for, like, two bucks. And I was like, yeah, I'll take it. Why not? [00:23:03] Speaker C: Sure. [00:23:04] Speaker B: Never have too many. Too many Beatles albums, covers. Because that was my. My introduction to music was Beatles. Like, when I was, you know, like four or five and I got a hold of my mom's Beatles records and a vinyl player, I used to listen to them on my, like, little storybook. Oh, yeah. Like, little storybook record player. And. And I remember it was. Well, I can't remember what it was called, but it was something about a bear. But it was a little. Little, you know, book and vinyl, and you'd read along with it, and I would put the Beatles records on the record player and Beatles record. [00:23:39] Speaker C: So, yeah, that's really one of my son's primary influences. That and Chuck Berry. [00:23:47] Speaker B: Oh, wow. [00:23:48] Speaker C: Which was interesting when he was a teen. Not that he wasn't aware of kind of the contemporary music of that day, but what really grabbed him was Chuck Berry and the Beatles. That really roots rock and roll kind of thing. [00:24:05] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. And I think. I mean, I think I was kind of the same, like, when I was a little younger, where it was basically the music that I had access to, you know, in, like, the 70s and early 80s. Like, all I had basically was what my parents had, you know what I mean? So if I wanted to listen to music, I'm like, well, what do my parents have? And it was all, you know, that the rock and roll, you know, early rock and roll stuff. And I remember it was like Dick Clark had put out, like, these vinyls of, you know, like top 10 or top 20 songs or whatever. And there was a few different, you know, with, like, Bill Haley and the Comets and stuff. And I used to love those before I got into my own music. But, yeah, but I still love, like, everything. And I think that's what gave me the range of music is being exposed to just what I had. And just coincidentally, I had the good stuff, you know what I mean? Because, like, I could have been, you know, raised on, I don't know, German electronic music or something like, you know, no offense against German electronic music. [00:25:16] Speaker C: But, yeah, I was fortunate also that in the late 40s, early 50s, of course, there was no TV. [00:25:25] Speaker B: Right. [00:25:26] Speaker C: And everything was the radio. And back then, the stations didn't do genre, so you heard a lot of different music. So, you know, I might be listening to the radio and hear Hank Williams and then Frank Sinatra. I mean, it was just, you know, then, you Might hear a polka. I mean it was really. They just played music and they didn't really limit, you know, well, this is all we play. [00:26:00] Speaker B: And I think that would be a model that could work today, you know, if. If there was like a station that was just like, we'll play whatever like we deem good. [00:26:12] Speaker C: WA did that for a while and I think they called it in the industry garbage. Not. Not meaning it like kind of like a garbage plate. Yeah, everything. Everything's in here. Yeah. Yeah. And of course it was an AM station and most of the AM stations really couldn't survive anymore. But they did try that format where, you know, you and I think sometimes we X T and Radio X actually you can hear a wide variety of. Of music. It's not all one. [00:26:48] Speaker B: Well, and also I think a lot of that is that those are programmed by humans. [00:26:52] Speaker C: Yes. [00:26:53] Speaker B: You know, like a human being is looking at the music and choosing the music that's going. Even if like an aggregator picks, you know, what song or shuffles it or whatever. But like there's someone choosing that music and I think that's what separates it from. [00:27:09] Speaker C: Yeah. Where some of the FM is actually taking a feed from Los Angeles or somewhere. [00:27:17] Speaker B: Yeah. I used to work. I worked in radio for a long time and I used to board op for a shift and when I was boardopping, literally I was just taking in a satellite feed from this place. Taking in a satellite and turning up the volume at the appropriate time. Like there was nothing local happening. [00:27:32] Speaker C: Throw in a commercial if you had to pay local visitors or something. [00:27:35] Speaker B: But it wasn't too bad because I would sit there in a studio for a couple hours and not have to talk to anybody, just watch some TV and every 15 minutes I'd have to lower one volume and turn another one off. Like it's great. So I guess getting back like, you know, to the album. So I have it here and you were gracious enough to sign a copy of it for me. So we've got 12 songs. [00:28:01] Speaker C: Yes. [00:28:01] Speaker B: Yeah, that's a. That's a. That's a full length. That's a full length. So you know, you said it started with Telecaster Cowboy, ends with the reprise. Is that a theme throughout the songs or is it just kind of end. [00:28:16] Speaker C: Capped kind of bookends. [00:28:18] Speaker B: Okay. And I love the, the visual of Telecaster Cowboy. Now that you said like what it means, you know, because back then when that statement was made, country music was acoustic guitars, if. Right. Like for the most part. [00:28:33] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:28:34] Speaker B: And then when electric guitars started coming in it kind of shook things up a little bit. And. And I think Telecaster Cowboy is a fitting name. So is there any other. [00:28:48] Speaker C: If. [00:28:48] Speaker B: I don't know if you had just like a. Just because I can't let you leave without a fun story involving, like, a household name. So I don't know if you had any, you know, Johnny Cash stories or, you know, any. Any just fun anecdotes that you wanted to tell you. [00:29:04] Speaker C: One of the funniest stories. This is my son's favorite. We were playing the Vermont State Fair, and this was back in the 90s, and we had done load in, and the guys were setting up, and this guy pulls up in a camper, and he says, you can't be here. Says, what? We're hired to, you know, do a concert at such and such a time and all of that. He says, oh, no. He said, Ronald McDonald needs this stage. And so we said, sorry that, you know, but we're not gonna stop. This is what we're supposed to be doing. He says, oh, Ronald isn't gonna like this. And he pulled his camper over a ways. Well, a little while later, he came back and trying to be the peacemaker, I said, look, you need a microphone. He was going to do a bike giveaway for kids, which was supposed to happen a good hour before we were supposed to play. I said, we'll have a full sound system here, and we'll let you use our mic to do your bike giveaway. And he still kind of shakes. He said, I've got to go talk to Ronald about this. So he goes back in the camper. Well, when it gets near the time he was supposed to do his thing, out comes Ronald McDonald. And I kind of was just telling him, now this is what you do and everything. Well, okay. It was the same guy. He played this game of going back and forth between Ronald. He was the only one in that camper. Ronald isn't going to like this. [00:30:59] Speaker B: That is a good one. [00:31:00] Speaker C: You hit some funny things. But that. That had to be one of the best preempted by Ronald McDonald. [00:31:08] Speaker B: Ronald's not going to like this. So before you go, do we want to play another song off the album? [00:31:15] Speaker C: Sure. Maybe you'd like to try on the Fringe. I'll give you a brief thing the title of that came from. It was back in the 60s. And one of my mentors said, one day, what you need to do is find your place in the world. And. Okay. And so I was thinking, you know, have I found my place in the world. And I said, I guess if I have to kind of zero it in, it's really on the fringe. And that started me writing, and that's how this song came about. [00:31:56] Speaker B: All right. Awesome. [00:31:57] Speaker C: Out there on the fringe on the fringe Cool. [00:32:00] Speaker B: Well, let's check out on the fringe, Marty Wendell, and then we'll be right back to wrap it up. [00:32:10] Speaker D: I've never found it easy to color inside the lines or do things someone else's way? Cause I'd rather do it mine I'm always left a center But I never come unhinged I'm just used to living Somewhere out there on the fringe? Somewhere out there on the fringe. [00:32:58] Speaker C: Moving. [00:32:59] Speaker D: To the beat of Mount Drum Somewhere out there on the a fringe. [00:33:11] Speaker C: It'S. [00:33:12] Speaker D: Anybody'S guess what I overcome. [00:33:28] Speaker C: I have. [00:33:29] Speaker D: No use for small talk for things that make no sense There don't seem to be no rules that somehow I can't bend I reached into the fire Close enough that I got singed I'm way too used to living. [00:34:00] Speaker C: Somewhere out. [00:34:01] Speaker D: There on the fringe. [00:34:46] Speaker C: I find it. [00:34:47] Speaker D: Hard to hold the line and walk the straight and narrow where there's signs that point away I just ignore the arrows when other shout demands at me Makes me cringe it's the life that I keep living Somewhere out there on the fringe? Somewhere right there on the fringe. [00:35:33] Speaker C: Moving. [00:35:34] Speaker D: To the beat of Mount On Somewhere out there on the fringe it's anybody's guess what I'll become I know Way too used to living Somewhere out there. [00:36:10] Speaker C: On the fringe. [00:36:21] Speaker B: All right, that was on the fringe, Marty Wendell. And Marty, I want to thank you so much for taking time out of your day to come out and do this. I really appreciate it, and it's always cool to see you. But before we go, I want to give you a chance to say your gratitudes. [00:36:33] Speaker C: Well, first of all, thanks to you for being willing to have me here. That doesn't go unappreciated by any means. And we certainly want to thank all the people this summer that came out and that just continue to help us continue making music if we can. And I'd like to invite any of your listeners, hopefully. The plan is for a show on November 15th at the historic Hubbard hall in Cambridge, New York. And so maybe we'd see you out there. And hopefully we'll have a very special show that night. And thanks to all so far who have purchased the album. And if you're the digital type, they're going to be releasing the digital stuff January, so just keep an eye out for Telecaster Cowboy on whatever service you download your music. [00:37:35] Speaker B: All right, so he is Marty Wendell. I am Andy scullin. This is unsigned 518. I'll see you on the road. Unsigned 518 is produced and hosted by me, Andy Scullin. New episodes are available every week wherever you stream podcasts. If you would like to help support the show, please like and subscribe wherever you are listening. Or you could buy me a [email protected] unsigned 518 if you would like to advertise on the show, send me an email at unsigned518mail.com and to be a guest on the show, reach out to me through Instagram signed 518take care of one another and I'll see you next week.